You studied history and you're a Marxist? Sounds like you didn't study it very well. Type "communism 100 brazilian deaths" into Google Images and then come back to me
Lots of western historians study history extensively and still don’t escape the ideology of their class. Even a well-meaning Marxist is prone to have bad takes on history depending on who they read because, let’s face it, not everyone has the time or the will to read and vet primary historical sources.
The essential thing is not necessarily to be a History Knower but to recognize that every social relation is historically contingent. That includes wage labor, the state, race relations, religion, etc. If it is social then it typically has a material basis which can change over time. Because they usually lack this perspective, non-Marxists are more inclined to have reactionary takes on both current and historical events, regardless of how much history they know.
One excellent book I’m trying to finish is Michael Parenti’s The Assassination of Julius Caesar. Just one example of how historians have distorted the past due to their class lens.
Lots of western historians study history extensively and still don’t escape the ideology of their class
Wow. You just explained everything I have a problem with regarding my history professor in one sentence!
I do wonder how a historian who seems to understand history can then woefully misunderstand the USSR or other socialist powers. They know how to properly source something, how to interpret first and second hand accounts properly, how to spot an unreliable source, yet when it comes to the dreaded communism they just throw out everything they actually know about their field out the window.
You’d think that, and with the way he lectures you’d still think that he would know better, but nope, my man loves to gush about the Gulag Archipelago so that gives you an idea of where his views lie…
If a self-proclaimed Marxist can only quote European or Western Marxists, they are severely limited in their analyses.
Excuse me, I'll have you know capitalism is the most efficient system we've ever come up with! There are no alternatives! Socialism doesn't count because "Mao 1 gazillion iPhone Vevezula Stalin Spoon Human Nature Gulag!"
It's true, I can't think of any system that's more efficient at destroying the environment on a planetary scale.
Low-key, except we're trying our hardest to not stand by idly yet everyone insists we should and just vote instead.
Then we're arrested or intimidated with felony charges only to be dropped last minute
The continuation of Indian Residential fake school death camps from 1850s hat became the Nazi death camps into 1998 and unofficially continue after 1998 proved that Western European diaspora only oppose a Holocaust when it also targets the European emigrants as well. The Western European diaspora also still continue to imprison aboriginal people in federal reserve concentration camps under the false promise to fulfill the living necessity to the imprisoned Indigenous groups and staged chemical attacks against the imprisoned Indigenous tribes until they surrender their property ownership rights and the reparation for the fake school holocaust even when they complained about Nazi German doing the same thing.
Remember, Hitler’s greatest sin wasn’t genocide to the west; it was that he attacked europeans.
